NGAUS Virtual 5K Offers a Chance To Help Tell the National Guard Story

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National Guard Association of the U.S.

Aug 10, 2020, 12:09 ET

WASHINGTON, Aug. 10, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- The voice of nearly 45,000 current and former National Guard officers is offering all runners and walkers a chance to support the telling of the Guard story.

The opportunity is the NGAUS Virtual 5K, which is open to all. Cost is $30, with proceeds going to the National Guard Educational Foundation, which tells all 384 years of the Guard story. Among its programs is the National Guard Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C.

Registered participants will set their own 3.1-mile course and run or walk it between Aug. 24 and Aug. 30. Each will receive a commemorative medal in the mail. Postage is included in the registration fee.

More information and registration is available at https://runsignup.com/NGAUSvirtual5k. Registration closes at 11:59 p.m. Eastern on Aug. 16.

"Our annual fun run is normally an event at our conference," said retired Brig. Gen. J. Roy Robinson, the NGAUS and NGEF president. "We're going virtual this year, so we opened the run to anyone who would like to support our efforts to tell the Guard story."

The Guard's 384th year is one of its most unique. Thousands of Guard soldiers and airmen across every state, Guam, Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands and the District of Columbia have been responding to the coronavirus pandemic since March.

They have helped operate drive-through testing centers, delivered food and protective equipment, disinfected nursing homes, and even staffed call centers to help the jobless file for unemployment benefits.

Meanwhile, thousands of other Guardsmen have deployed overseas or responded to civil unrest. In early June, more than 120,000 Guardsmen were on duty at home or abroad.

NGAUS is conducting the virtual 5K in conjunction with its annual conference, which will be livestreamed from Washington, D.C., Aug. 28-29. Speakers include service chiefs and the new senior leaders of the National Guard Bureau.

More conference details are available at www.ngaus.org/events/142nd-general-conference.

About NGAUS: The association includes nearly 45,000 current or former Guard officers. It was created in 1878 to provide unified National Guard representation in Washington. In their first productive meeting after Reconstruction, militia officers from the North and South formed the association with the goal of obtaining better equipment and training by educating Congress on Guard requirements. Today, 142 years later, NGAUS has the same mission.

SOURCE National Guard Association of the U.S.